Cersei vs Tyrell, another GoT prediction

In the recent episode of Game of Thrones, something weird happened. No, not Daenerys killing the Khals and everyone else in the command hut. No, not Theon backing his sister instead of his own claim. No, not Brienne all but threatening Melissandre and Davos. No, not Ramsey killing the wildling girl. No, not Jon Snow and Sansa Stark finally reuniting the Stark clan members for the first time in years. All of those were to be expected.

What was really strange was the behavior of Loras and the confession of Tommen about something that the High Sparrow told him. To me, there’s an impending chaos here that was hinted at and that I have predicted previously. The most obvious connection is that Cersei and Jaime managed to convince Lady Olenna Tyrell and Kevan Lannister to go along with their plan to bring in Tyrell troops to break Queen Margaery Tyrell out of the clink before her own supposed walk of atonement. If you think that the secret that the High Sparrow told Tommen is about Margaery’s atonement, there is literally nothing pointing to that being the case.

First, remember the circumstances around Cersei’s atonement. She confessed. She broke down to see her child. The atonement came only after her confession. Margaery, on the other hand, had absolutely no interest in bowing to the High Sparrow. Her reaction to Loras’s complete breakdown was a show of strength, to try to lift him up, but his reaction to that was more of a man who had been pushed over a threshold. To him, the damage had already been done. He had already fallen. He was irredeemable.

What could Loras possibly have done to push himself over a point of no return? What had he revealed to the High Sparrow, who had passed on the information to King Tommen.

It is my belief, and it seems others have posted about this online as well, that Loras spilled a dark secret about the Tyrells, one that the High Sparrow felt would help Tommen with healing and understanding why the Tyrells must stay imprisoned. What secret could that be? Well, Lady Olenna had worked with Petyr Baelish to murder Joffrey. You forgot about that? So did most of the other viewers, I think, and that makes sense. After all, every viewer was as happy about Joffrey dying as they are going to be about Ramsey dying after his clash with Jon Snow. For a TV viewer, Joffrey’s death was over and done with and not soon enough. Justice had been done. Except, Cersei would never see Joffrey’s death as justified. She did not relish in his death.Her children are sacrosanct, no matter how awful they might be. When she finds out who killed her boy, revenge will occupy her entire mind until it is done.

So, it is my belief that the High Sparrow told Tommen that as part of his ongoing confession, Loras had admitted that the death of Joffrey was at the hand of his grandmother Olenna and not Sansa Stark or Tyrion Lannister. I am unsure of whether or not Littlefinger will have been implicated by Loras. It depends on how loose Olenna’s tongue was with her family. However, Cersei is about to get her revenge. Here is how I expect it to go down.

The Fall of the Tyrells

The Tyrell troops will enter the city and put the Sparrows to the sword. I still think Margaery will die, and I have a feeling that Lady Olenna will die at the hands of Zombie Mountain, while Cersei watches. I can’t imagine Cersei letting Lady Olenna die in some more dignified way. Margaery, as I’ve said before, is likely to die in the oncoming melee. Whether it is Zombie Mountain or the Sparrows, the effect on Olenna Tyrell will be devastating, as Cersei expects, but I don’t think she quite understands the effect it will have on Tommen.

The New Impotence of the Lannisters

Cersei has no foresight and believes she is a lion that can stand alone against the rest of the kingdom. The loss of the Tyrells is going to hit the Lannisters much harder than Cersei realizes. House Lannister no longer has its gold mines and is in major debt. Her father struck the deal with the Tyrells out of necessity, and with the Tyrell bond forever severed, House Lannister will lose all of its monetary and troop support from the Tyrells. Cersei will almost certainly lose Tommen (due to Margaery’s likely death), and I still think it’s going to be by his own hand after he finds out about Margaery. Loras will die a miserable death.

Ramsay

Ramsay is going to be sandwiched in between the armies of Jon Snow, the Umbers, and Littlefinger’s army from the Vale. Other men will join Jon Snow once they hear of a Stark marching on Winterfell. But Ramsay is likely to take out several main characters, and not just the wildling girl Osha whom he killed in “Book of the Stranger.” Whether Rickon lives or dies is completely up to the producers. I don’t feel he has any major part, and killing him may just serve as additional reminders that Ramsay must go (not that any viewer doubts it at this point). Ramsay must be dealt with before Jon can deal with the White Walkers. He is almost certainly going to die during the Battle of Winterfell in Episode 9.

Littlefinger

Petyr Baelish is probably going to have an inglorious death. It’s unlikely to be Varys’s doing (certainly not directly). Littlefinger is playing too dangerous a game and is far too obvious in his ploys now. He is above his station, and his most obvious weakness would be if Robin Arryn suddenly reverses in his reverence to Littlefinger. Petyr no longer has his main sources of income from brothels in King’s Landing due to the Sparrows, and he is over-reliant on his power from the Vale. Sansa is going to be wroth with him, and Brienne is likely to speak poorly of him. He’ll overplay his hand soon, and he will probably die a commoner’s death (e.g., being tossed through the moon door in the Vale).

Well, that’s enough speculative predictions for now!

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About Rex JamesonRex Jameson is the author of the three novels in the Primal Patterns series and half a dozen short stories. An avid history buff and an unabashed nerd with an appetite for science fiction and fantasy, he loves to create complex speculative fiction with layered characters. He earned a PhD in Computer Science at Vanderbilt University and researches distributed artificial intelligence in robotics at Carnegie Mellon University. Rex and his wife Jenny live in Pittsburgh where they enjoy hosting family and friends.